Scientists can’t seem to agree that the globe is warming, or if it is, that it’s the result of man’s activities to any significant degree, or what the long term effects are likely to be. It occurs to me that before the emergence of modern man there were massive wildfires on a regular basis around the globe spewing tons of carbon into the atmosphere. For example, a study in Yosemite National Park indicates that before Europeans came along, 16,000 acres per year burned just within that small geographic area. We mostly contain wildfires now, while we burn fossil fuels. Maybe it’s a wash.
But getting to the point, I think we’re asking the wrong questions. Let’s assume for now that the globe is indeed warming and not worry for the moment about the cause. Instead let’s ask the question: Is it a bad thing? Why are we assuming that having the earth go through a warming cycle is disastrous? Global Warming advocates, who are now called Climate Change advocates to fit more recent data, insist that huge portions of coastal land will be flooded as the oceans rise due to melting of the polar ice caps and that massive deserts will develop as the earth warms. But these same people are telling us that recent massive snow, cold, and rain along America’s eastern seaboard is the result of warming that causes additional evaporation from the oceans putting more moisture into the atmosphere leading to more precipitation. This theory sounds more or less plausible except for the fact that scientists are now saying that the earth’s temperature has been stable for at least the last 15 years, and maybe cooling.
But that aside, we’re assuming here that the earth is warming, so if a global warming trend causes more snow and rain, and focusing just on North America for the moment, wouldn’t it be probable that much of this additional rain would fall in the western part of the continent since weather tends to move from the Pacific Ocean inland?
I was thinking of these things on a recent flight from Central Oregon to Salt Lake over the high desert region of southeast Oregon and northwest Nevada into northern Utah. I’ve flown much of the adjacent country in private planes, seeing it from a sparrow’s view rather than an eagle’s. Further, I’ve driven much of eastern Oregon, parts of Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, western Colorado, Wyoming, and southern California, and I’ve seen much of west Texas from 30 thousand feet. This is thousands of square miles of arid land; virtually half of the landmass of the lower 48 States that, with the exception of a few pockets of irrigated land, is worthless as far as human habitation or growing crops is concerned for lack of water. So is much of Mexico.
How could more rain in these areas be a bad thing? How could a slightly warmer climate? Wouldn’t some significant percentage of these areas and similar vast areas in Africa, Asia, and Australia becoming productive land be reasonable compensation for the shrinking of some islands? I’ll acknowledge that some species might be endangered, but that’s not the primary argument of the Climate Change advocates. Their argument is that we are destroying the planet’s ability to sustain humans. Might it be just the opposite?
How much effect might there be? Might Mexico become mostly rain forest? Might Arizona and New Mexico become lush? North Africa? The Arabian Peninsula? The vast deserts of western Australia? Might the Great Basin become an inland sea again, or alternately, be engineered to drain large tributaries into the Colorado River system finally giving greedily thirsty Los Angeles ample water? And if these changes are taking place it’s obvious that they are happening very gradually so humans can respond over time to make previously worthless land productive even as other land is lost to rising tides. But a simple look at a topographical map proves that the area potentially made productive by additional rain is many, many times the area that might be lost. Yes, people will be displaced, but people have been being displaced throughout history by various phenomenon. Perhaps these modern displacements could be humane and to the ultimate benefit of the people such as when people who were moved in the 1930s due to intentional flooding of the Tennessee Valley.
And if there’s more moisture in the atmosphere, won’t this mean more clouds, and don’t clouds reflect the sun’s rays, and won’t this tend to have a cooling effect so the polar ice caps won’t melt as much as anticipated? And if thousands of square miles of present desert become rain forest or at least grassland, won’t vast amounts of water be captured by this vegetation and in marshes and various wetlands, and in those added clouds, and in rivers and vast lakes such as the one that will fill Death Valley. And won’t this leave less water to overfill the oceans? Aren’t these perfect examples of how the earth continues to be, as it always has been, a stable system that tends to self-correct perturbations on a global scale even while local changes occur?
I’m not a scientist, and my description of our climatic future is probably not accurate, but I’ve had a career in engineering and I understand the concept of scientific modeling enough to know that the advocates of “Climate Change” can’t agree on their models and that their models change to fit current data including last week’s cold and last year’s warm. There’s no reason to believe that their models are any more accurate than what I describe.
Change is inevitable and no matter what the change, some segment of the population will view it negatively. Thousands of years ago when the oceans rose and Britain was separated from the European continent, whether this was a gradual process or a virtually instantaneous one as some scientists believe, there must have been many that saw the event as catastrophic. Few inhabitants of the British Isles in 1941 would agree. Currently the fact that Britain is an island can be viewed as neither good nor bad; it just is, and now it’s the norm. People adapt; species adapt; and life on earth goes on. “Global Warming”, if it’s actually happening, whether man caused or not, will bring localized changes. There’s no reason to believe that these changes will be catastrophic.
But getting to the point, I think we’re asking the wrong questions. Let’s assume for now that the globe is indeed warming and not worry for the moment about the cause. Instead let’s ask the question: Is it a bad thing? Why are we assuming that having the earth go through a warming cycle is disastrous? Global Warming advocates, who are now called Climate Change advocates to fit more recent data, insist that huge portions of coastal land will be flooded as the oceans rise due to melting of the polar ice caps and that massive deserts will develop as the earth warms. But these same people are telling us that recent massive snow, cold, and rain along America’s eastern seaboard is the result of warming that causes additional evaporation from the oceans putting more moisture into the atmosphere leading to more precipitation. This theory sounds more or less plausible except for the fact that scientists are now saying that the earth’s temperature has been stable for at least the last 15 years, and maybe cooling.
But that aside, we’re assuming here that the earth is warming, so if a global warming trend causes more snow and rain, and focusing just on North America for the moment, wouldn’t it be probable that much of this additional rain would fall in the western part of the continent since weather tends to move from the Pacific Ocean inland?
I was thinking of these things on a recent flight from Central Oregon to Salt Lake over the high desert region of southeast Oregon and northwest Nevada into northern Utah. I’ve flown much of the adjacent country in private planes, seeing it from a sparrow’s view rather than an eagle’s. Further, I’ve driven much of eastern Oregon, parts of Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, western Colorado, Wyoming, and southern California, and I’ve seen much of west Texas from 30 thousand feet. This is thousands of square miles of arid land; virtually half of the landmass of the lower 48 States that, with the exception of a few pockets of irrigated land, is worthless as far as human habitation or growing crops is concerned for lack of water. So is much of Mexico.
How could more rain in these areas be a bad thing? How could a slightly warmer climate? Wouldn’t some significant percentage of these areas and similar vast areas in Africa, Asia, and Australia becoming productive land be reasonable compensation for the shrinking of some islands? I’ll acknowledge that some species might be endangered, but that’s not the primary argument of the Climate Change advocates. Their argument is that we are destroying the planet’s ability to sustain humans. Might it be just the opposite?
How much effect might there be? Might Mexico become mostly rain forest? Might Arizona and New Mexico become lush? North Africa? The Arabian Peninsula? The vast deserts of western Australia? Might the Great Basin become an inland sea again, or alternately, be engineered to drain large tributaries into the Colorado River system finally giving greedily thirsty Los Angeles ample water? And if these changes are taking place it’s obvious that they are happening very gradually so humans can respond over time to make previously worthless land productive even as other land is lost to rising tides. But a simple look at a topographical map proves that the area potentially made productive by additional rain is many, many times the area that might be lost. Yes, people will be displaced, but people have been being displaced throughout history by various phenomenon. Perhaps these modern displacements could be humane and to the ultimate benefit of the people such as when people who were moved in the 1930s due to intentional flooding of the Tennessee Valley.
And if there’s more moisture in the atmosphere, won’t this mean more clouds, and don’t clouds reflect the sun’s rays, and won’t this tend to have a cooling effect so the polar ice caps won’t melt as much as anticipated? And if thousands of square miles of present desert become rain forest or at least grassland, won’t vast amounts of water be captured by this vegetation and in marshes and various wetlands, and in those added clouds, and in rivers and vast lakes such as the one that will fill Death Valley. And won’t this leave less water to overfill the oceans? Aren’t these perfect examples of how the earth continues to be, as it always has been, a stable system that tends to self-correct perturbations on a global scale even while local changes occur?
I’m not a scientist, and my description of our climatic future is probably not accurate, but I’ve had a career in engineering and I understand the concept of scientific modeling enough to know that the advocates of “Climate Change” can’t agree on their models and that their models change to fit current data including last week’s cold and last year’s warm. There’s no reason to believe that their models are any more accurate than what I describe.
Change is inevitable and no matter what the change, some segment of the population will view it negatively. Thousands of years ago when the oceans rose and Britain was separated from the European continent, whether this was a gradual process or a virtually instantaneous one as some scientists believe, there must have been many that saw the event as catastrophic. Few inhabitants of the British Isles in 1941 would agree. Currently the fact that Britain is an island can be viewed as neither good nor bad; it just is, and now it’s the norm. People adapt; species adapt; and life on earth goes on. “Global Warming”, if it’s actually happening, whether man caused or not, will bring localized changes. There’s no reason to believe that these changes will be catastrophic.
Your introduction is weak, but your basic point is sound; there would be many benefits to warming if it were to happen, and these have been largely ignored. And as Bjorn Lomborg has pointed out, spending trillions now to blunt a problem that happens 100 years from now is a bad use of the money, compared to other uses.
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